ISP Sky Broadband to Launch Gigafast 900Mbps Fibre Package
Credible sources have informed ISPreview that UK ISP Sky Broadband (Comcast, Sky TV) are about to launch a new 900Mbps “Gigafast” package for homes, which will continue to be based off Openreach’s 1000Mbps (115Mbps upload) capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) product tier and should cost £55 per month.
As before, you’ll only be able to take this product if you’re covered by Openreach’s new full fibre network, which is currently available to 6.4 million UK premises and should reach 25 million (80%+ of the country) by December 2026.
The new package should complement Sky Broadband’s existing “Ultrafast” (145Mbps – average median speed as measured at peak time) and “Ultrafast Plus” (500Mbps) plans on the same network, which cost from £32 per month for the first 18 months of service (£40 thereafter) and £42 per month for the first 18 months (£50 thereafter) respectively. A one-off £19.95 or £9.95 setup fee often also applies, but this is current free.
By comparison, the new “Gigafast” (900Mbps) plan is expected to cost from £55 per month for the first 18 months of service (£60 thereafter). Customers can also expect to receive the operator’s Sky Broadband Hub router (SR203 / Hub 4.2), a VoIP based home phone service, parental controls and unlimited usage.
The new package also comes attached to Sky’s usual Speed Guarantee, which enables customers to claim money back if the connection performance drops below 600Mbps (for 3 consecutive days or more). Otherwise, the final launch date for this new package could change, but there’s a strong expectation of it arriving by the end of this week.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook and Linkedin.
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Quite expensive… but good to see that more competition enters the 1gig market. Now isps just need to find a way to market their fttp better… I think the ads should be more educational… many people think they already got fibre and think it is super unreliable
Anon – YouFibre?
Right. You wrote above that it’s great value if you don’t mind AUPs, FUPs and contention.
Leased lines seem to have become much more popular among the anonymous denizens of ISPR.
What kind of contract length are you looking at for getting one so cheaply?
BTnet usually occupy the upper end of the market as far as pricing is concerned, so to be quoted 1Gbps with BT for £300 (+VAT) a month would put their retail pricing on a par with the reseller pricing that is available to a lot of the industry.
Very aggressive pricing, assuming that the service actually exists.
Very good deal indeed given BTNet 100 Mbps is £300 a month + VAT over 5 years.
Removing a blockage from the lead-in duct by the looks of it.
Not a bad picture – I presume it was taken on a phone? Which one?
Yeah I’m out of this one.
It was to see which response came back. Maybe remove the Exif data next time?
OPPO OPPO Find X3 Lite 5G
1/136s ƒ/1 ISO100 4.73mm — Less Exif data
Manufacturer OPPO
Model OPPO Find X3 Lite 5G
A picture of the work being done to install a £250/month, 5 year contract BTNet circuit at a time when cost of living is rocketing taken on a £380 phone from a modest property with kitchen facing the pretty modest street. Seems legit.
Actually for my own sanity I’m out of the site full stop. Hardly any IT professionals contribute to the comments due to them being a cesspit of people abusing anonymity that makes Twitter look like the Oxford Debating Society by comparison.
It’s even worse over the past days and weeks due to a very few people and nothing ever gets done or will ever get done. Presumably drama drives clicks, certainly has worked on me but enough is enough.
You win Anon/whichever name you’re using today. My congratulations.
Lol. Just lol.
Of course you forgot which phone you just took that pic on 5 mins before to prove a point… lol
Ouch Carl 🙂
@Anon
you said “Modest it might be – but it’s one of 4 in this area – so I can guarantee my houses are worth DOUBLE whatever your one is.”
You have to love some peoples comments, you know nothing about others but then make claims like this. Get a grip as you’re making yourself look a dick.
I was going to leave this however I was genuinely messaged and it was suggested I pop in for another message.
You’ve spent weeks on here under various guises claiming to have a leased line and using it as a conversation topic with the usual ‘considerably richer than you’ nonsense – https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2022/04/isp-sky-broadband-to-launch-gigafast-900mbps-fibre-package.html#comment-260534 – now you’ve taken the opportunity of a subcontractor doing some lead-in duct work to try and prove you had one installed.
You didn’t – that subcontractor was doing civils work, he didn’t install a DIA, the subcontractors that dig/rod don’t splice fibre. You’d have needed some fibre splicing, it’s not one long cable from wherever into the property. It’s not a coincidence that you don’t want to post anything that gives actual confirmation. You’ve said nothing about a subsequent visit.
The double speed promotion is a thing courtesy of some Openreach promotions. Double speed doesn’t mean 500Mb for 16% less than 100.
Why would BT offer some random ordering one service such a heavy discount when they are barely keeping up with DIA demand anyway?
The landlord claims alongside the massive businessman claims keep popping up. This you? Same writing style but hard to tell with all the anonymous boxes of trolls on here:
https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2022/04/clarifying-virgin-media-policy-on-exit-charges-for-off-net-home-moves.html#comment-260484
‘@AQX They asked me for proof I sent them all that I thought they needed. But when you are buying a house there isn’t much apart from receipts etc’
‘Yes my phone is an Oppo. I have that and a Oukitel K1000 so I thought I had taken it on that’
I doubt you own an Oukitel. You’re fixated on bandwidth and purchased a very robust phone that only has wireless 802.11n? More likely a work phone.
‘Modest it might be – but it’s one of 4 in this area – so I can guarantee my houses are worth DOUBLE whatever your one is.’
Indeed. You just stay in a modest property that doesn’t have especially good Internet provision and instead sign up to spend £15k over 5 years for a service when full fibre at much faster speeds will very likely be there in months or a year or two because it makes business sense. You could take your considerably richer than you wealth and buy a new build with Hyperoptic + Openreach FTTP installed, an apartment with conceirge service, in the north a pretty big detached, but instead you’re where you are allegedly paying £250 a month for Internet instead of either using your obviously huge cash pile or a few hundred a month on a mortgage to live far more salubriously.
There is nothing believable here. You write about the exact same things as the guy who kindly admitted at least 3 of his aliases on here in exactly the same manner and, frankly, I’m not sure why people with genuine questions and information on here should have to wade through this excrement. Most don’t which is why interaction with ISPs and professionals on here is so rare which is a real shame.
With that the configuration I initiated is done, so back to it. I did briefly wonder if I’d come back to a substantial response and be proven wrong in which case I’d have apologised profusely but didn’t need to worry – the actual amount of people posting here is relatively small, the ones constantly claiming to have leased lines installed, property empires, are too good for pathetic consumer grade broadband, are huge on kicking the poor, etc, even fewer.
Thanks for playing!
Rip off and so is virgin media both rip off for high teir Broadband
Compared to 5g home broadband from 3 is 21 month at the moment
The £55 to £60 range seems roughly in keeping with the current market, so it’s not a rip-off. But this perspective may change as alternative networks grow more coverage and, often (but not always), with cheaper prices.
Yes it is pal as I wouldn’t pay that even if I was a billionaire
5g home broadband is much cheaper faster also plug and play simple as .
5G is a different technology and comes with its own problems of coverage, speed variance, 4G latency and CGNat etc. Good if you can get it, but it’s not fttp.
https://5g.co.uk/guides/how-fast-is-5g/ gives some interesting reading on 5G speeds. In the real world, it appears to compete with the entry FTTP packages market by many CSPs.
Only problem with 5g is coverage and reliability. I have had BT FTTP 900 for over a year and am unlucky if the speed drops below 800meg. BT actually now say it wont drop below 700 or you can leave your contract. If you check youtube you will see most people on 5g only get up to 250 most of the time on 3. Also Openreach upload speeds currently go up to 110 meg most of the time, and they have room to double that to 220meg whenever they want to. There is no comparison with national coverage of gigabit broadband to 5g on 3 (at the minute). At my postcode i probably wont be offered a 5g signal for at least another year (as with most people) so cant agree with your argument that FTTP is a rip off compared to 5g.
@Bent, Mark is right here £55-£60 is average. No-one said you had to buy it.
5G and FTTP are not comparable, it’s not all about speeds!
@Bent
I just looked and Three aren’t even offering it where live….so I have a choice of “rip off” and bugger all.
That true mine smarty get 875Mbps down and 122Mbps up on 5G
Why not take your 5G and become literate, then go find a better job? Might bring you that warm fuzzy feeling where the desire to troll here currently lives.
Wasn’t there a major controversy this time last year as Openreach were going to considerably drop their FTTP prices to those around the same as what CityFibre were charging. Thus resulting in every altnet going insane saying it will put them out of business. Did Openreach change their minds? Currently Vodafone are offering 900/900 up and down through CityFibre for £29 a month. Its almost half this.
CityFibre has an ongoing legal dispute over those – hearing due in May 2022.
https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2021/12/cityfibre-start-legal-fight-over-ofcom-approval-of-openreach-fttp-price-cut.html
Yep CityFibre (and every other Altnet/Virgin) are allowed to try and bankrupt BT but if BT want to reduce their wholesale prices, all hell breaks loose and CityFibre etc all run to the courts.
Something isn’t right here were only one company is financially shackled and the wealthier opposition aren’t.
BT have nothing to do with Openreach anymore. They are separate companies. BT could offer any deal it wants and CityFibre would have no issue. But Openreach are supposed to not be allowed to do what they are doing.
“BT have nothing to do with Openreach anymore”
Ha ha ha ha
Is that supposed to be a late April Fool’s joke?
You give you an obvious example: if BT were truly independent from Openreach then the likes of BT Retail would be most likely selling FTTP services over major altnets such as Cityfibre. But that’s never gonna happen in a million years – that would be like biting the hand that feeds them.
*To
@Anon
Tell BT and they will investigate it under their guarantee.
@anon
Oops sorry my mistake
This seems reasonable. If they are planning to keep it at 600 they’re saying it’s a 600 Mbit guarantee, 940-ish Mbit burst downstream with 110 Mbit upstream.
This really isn’t bad at all. I don’t get the hostility. If you don’t want it, don’t buy it. If it’s too expensive don’t buy it. 300/50 will do everything a residential home needs, albeit slower than a faster service.
40/10 or 80/20 FTTC will do everything a residential home needs at present.
@Phil
It will do what a household of your calibre or less will do.
@Mike
In Openreach FTTP only areas, around 80% of households have opted for 80/20 or less – that’s according to TBB stats. So I’m afraid a household of YOUR calibre is in the minority.
@Phil “40/10 or 80/20 FTTC will do everything a residential home needs at present.”
No this wont, not for me. The upload is too low, if I want to stream a Blu-ray rip from my Plex while in a different location I need much higher around 30Mb/s ish or higher each! don’t even start me on 4k haha.
To be honest, apart from the pricing, Sky should think about fixing their router. In Italy (where they implement MAP-T by the way) there’s tons of complaints on the software, some settings are on the app, some other ones on the web interface, Wi-Fi drops, firewall is shambles… and because of MAP-T you cannot change it unless you get some OpenWRT one. Performance is not going to be great in dual stack either I think, it’s simply not powerful enough and they had to patch many things in the base OpenWRT.
I think MAP-T isn’t hardware accelerated while dual stack should be. In fact there can’t be that much kit at all with ASIC capabilities with MAP-T.
@CarIT it is hw accelerated with a patch they requested to Broadcom, but the underlying chip is just at its limit. Plus remember that MAP-T would be a burden only for IPv4 traffic, IPv6 is native and that has issues anyways, again at least in Italy but the hardware is the same as the UK/ROI one. There’s been issues with not being able to achieve 940Mbps on IPv6 too, besides all the rest I mentioned.
Understood. I guess they could play games with the chip to get some of it out of software. The IPv6 issue I expect it to come in a bit lower due to the higher overheads and smaller MSS on v6.
If the kit needs to fragment and reassemble IPv4 that’s not to help either.
You would have thought this would all have been tested with a standard traffic mix but evidently the lure of volume discounts on an unsuitable CPE was too much.
There’s a new router coming. It’s not public knowledge yet but watch this space. It’s got a cool name too.
Plusnet are now the only provider – no FTTP still.
I’ve got a feeling plusnet are circling the drain. Since the EE takeover BT has always been a two brand pony. Plusnet seems to be the poor relation. I’ve seen a few clients pushed off PN VDSL onto BT FTTP with all fees waived. Says a lot about churn and retention. Lets shift everyone off and let it die. I remember when PN was worth the premium they charged.
Think I will stick to my gig with city fibre over giganet for £40 per month
took long enough man
Anons a cun*t tory Voter R u cun*t ? Sound like a out of touch selfish cun*t
I love to punch you in face tory cun*t.
Can’t wait for this! Glad it’s finally public knowledge, we found out about this a few weeks ago
Ultrafast Max incoming…